Jenkins is currently in prison. For example, in January 2006, Jenkins and Sergeant Michael Fries had an altercation with brothers Charles and Robert Lee after they continued to drink beer on the front step of their grandmother's home when the policemen had told them to stop. Washington (AFP) - A police officer described as perhaps the most corrupt in the history of the Baltimore police department was sentenced to 25 years in prison on Thursday. Then he said something that struck Ward as bizarre: He said he was going to take the marijuana to his home, and burn it all. "I never took a thing. In federal prison, inmates are only allowed to talk on the phone for 15 minutes before the line is automatically cut. They said that while they had their backs turned, someone had clocked OConnor and taken off. Wayne Jenkins will be played by Jon Bernthal, the same actor who portrayed "The Punisher". However, he was also sued for misconduct before his arrest in 2017. And Jenkins says, Did you look in the console? And he pulls the rug back and boom. Jenkins started calling Stepp to the scenes of arrests, encouraging Stepp to try to get inside drug dealer's hideouts to steal whatever cash or narcotics he could find. Jenkins names two specific locations where he says the drugs get tossed: a train bridge near the Eastern District police station, and a wooded highway off-ramp on the way to the Northern District police station. By Justin Fenton June 12, 2019 More in the series Part 1 The rise of Wayne. Both men have requested new trials. At OConnors trial, Fries remarked that the others were worthless and didnt meet the standards of the organized crime unit. He popped the trunk and carried the drugs into the garage. Wayne Jenkins' police vehicle when he was arrested in 2017. Arrest him, too, Jenkins yelled at the responding officers. Jenkins, who is serving a 25-year sentence in a federal prison in South Carolina, declined to speak with The Sun. Prosecutors pointed to the fact that Jenkins fabricated evidence, like producing a bogus iPhone video of his officers cracking a drug dealer's safe, when they had in fact already broken into it and stolen $200,000 in cash. Contact Justin Fenton at jfenton@baltsun.com. This series was supported by the Pulitzer Center. On June 7, 2018, he was sentenced to 25 years in prison. The line goes dead, and I feel like I've barely gotten anywhere. In the bedroom, Jenkins says he and a veteran supervisor found a suitcase filled with tens of thousands of dollars in cash. Sneed was chased and caught, and his jaw was broken in the process. "It strikes at the foundation of our entire criminal justice system.". I mean, it had velocity, Jenkins said. During his time on the streets of Baltimore Jenkins was involved. Plainclothes officers made the most arrests, they seized the most drugs and money, assets, former Police Commissioner Kevin Davis told The Sun. Wayne Jenkins, who led . "He is no more than a common criminal," Davis' daughter, Shirley Johnson, said of Jenkins. Read about our approach to external linking. This kind of mindset assumes that the victims of the Gun Trace Task Force - many of them black and poor - deserved what happened to them. They had the autonomy to catch and release suspects and develop informants. A squad of veteran police officers stood accused of committing numerous robberies, as well as extortion and overtime fraud. Jenkins winced as the handcuffs were placed on his wrists, and US Marshals led him out of a back door of the courtroom. Dan Horgan said his mentality was your typical Marine camaraderie, teamwork. Later, Jenkins came out carrying two kilos of cocaine he tossed in Stepp's vehicle. No one took anything, but Jenkins later mused about the possibilities. BALTIMORE The Baltimore City Board of Estimates paid out a $6 million settlement Wednesday to the family of a bystander who died during a police chase by the . Shawn Whiting, a man whose house was robbed of $16,000 and a kilo-and-a-half of heroin, testified that he knew that as a drug dealer, his word counted for much less than the officers'. "I have no respect for him.". OConnor had been sloppy drunk, they testified, and his friends said they would get him home. Its a Viking mentality: You go out into the field among the bad guys, and you bring back a bounty, Davis said. "I just go through this on a daily basis, scared of police, wondering when they gonna stop you, trying to plant drugs on you or something like that. Just how long ago Jenkins began stealing isnt clear. In November 2012, Wayne Jenkins was promoted to the rank of sergeant giving him new authority and freedom. This call is from", A human voice breaks in: "Wayne Jenkins.". Sneed's attorney Michael Pulver concluded, per Fenton, that the officers had "fabricated this story to hide the fact that they intentionally assaulted and falsely arrested and imprisoned Mr. The matter was referred to the police integrity unit of the Baltimore states attorneys office for investigation. I deserve to go to jail.". In Jenkins' plea, it says that "in April 2015 following the riots after the death of Freddie Gray, Jenkins brought DS prescription medicines that he had stolen from someone looting a pharmacy so that DS could sell the medications". Back before our interview, Jenkins' representative wanted me to speak to some of his old high school friends. And that is what they want, German said, according to an Internal Affairs report. Finally, in March 2015, Internal Affairs chief Rodney Hill informed Jenkins that he was being charged internally with misconduct, neglect of duty and failure to supervise the officer in his charge, according to a leaked copy of the case file obtained by The Sun. They testified he told them to carry BB guns to plant if they ever injured or killed an unarmed person, that he often took large quantities of drugs off of suspects without submitting them to the police evidence room. "Seen it done, honest to god, 500 times.". They didnt call for an ambulance or even write a report. Then-Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake held a news conference to tout one of Jenkins big drug busts. Join half a million readers enjoying Newsweek's free newsletters, L-R: Former Baltimore police Sergeant Wayne Jenkins, and Jon Bernthal as Jenkins in HBO true-crime drama "We Own This City. To single him out as a flawed individual in an otherwise perfectly functioning system is a way to avoid change in the police department, to shirk the responsibility of actually preventing this from happening again. Here's what the public was led to believe about the Gun Trace Task Force, before the FBI arrested almost every member of the squad: That in a city still reeling from the civil unrest that followed the 2015 death of Freddie Gray in police custody, the GTTF was a bright spot in a department under a dark cloud. His wife is also depicted earlier in the series when Wayne, in his early days, attends a barbecue with his colleagues from the Baltimore Police Department and is annoyed by how they have more money than him. Yes. Jenkins and members of his squad were praised for their work getting guns off the streets in an October 2016 police department newsletter. Jon Bernthal embedded with Baltimore police to play city's dirtiest cop in HBO's "We Own This City" On "Salon Talks" Bernthal reveals he spoke to the real Sgt. Not all the allegations against Jenkins came from lawsuits. Any attempts to make the force become less of a warrior and more of a guardian was looked at terribly, he said. Stepp was on home confinement for six months with an ankle monitor until this summer. I sold drugs as a dirty cop," he says. 3.4M views, 20K likes, 1.4K loves, 6.8K comments, 52K shares, Facebook Watch Videos from The Baltimore Sun: A criminal with a badge: A Baltimore Sun investigation into the story of Baltimore Police. Blake who in 2017 would wind up presiding over the Gun Trace Task Force corruption case noted that the other officers present backed Jenkins account. His eye socket was fractured. At one point, dozens of pharmacies were looted and millions of dollars worth of medication went missing. HBO's new true-crime drama stars Jon Bernthal as Jenkins, with the show examining Jenkins' rise in the city's police department and eventual arrest after a two-year federal investigation into the GTTF. Jenkins says that the veteran goaded him into taking money. He calls Stepp "the biggest exaggerator I've ever met in my life". But, he added, I think that if I am held responsible for my actions, then the same should be with the officers for their wrongdoing.. Jenkins, shown here with then-Commissioner Kevin Davis, was awarded a bronze star in April 2016 for his efforts to save injured officers during the unrest a year earlier. Later, Jenkins did more than talk about such a theft. So he gave up and entered a guilty plea. The GTTF was made up of eight officers, all but one of whom were indicted. The unit began looking into a case involving Jenkins, in which he had run down a young man with his unmarked Dodge Avenger early in 2014. But the video captured by closed-circuit TV showed the officers searching the car extensively and never appearing to make a discovery. In the annals of the Baltimore Police Department, Wayne Jenkins name was not being associated with wrongdoing. View all articles on the Gun Trace Task Force on The Baltimore Sun. The bondsman would take care of selling them, then split the profits with the police sergeant. De Sousa, who is now serving a federal sentence for tax evasion, said through his attorney that he does not remember the Jenkins case. In May 2014, three Baltimore prosecutors convened a meeting. But the scope of the corruption of Jenkins and his men remains a singular stain on the force. Across the country, these plainclothes squads have often been where scandals are born. Jenkins was a member of the Baltimore police department's Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF), a plain-clothed unit tasked with finding guns and drugs in bulk in a bid to tackle the city's high murder. I ask this friend why he didn't say anything to anyone. Wayne Jenkins, Baltimore's dirtiest cop, is sentenced: It still doesn't feel like justice Jenkins was supposed to get guns off the street in Baltimore but wound up running a vicious. As the leader of the unit, he received the longest prison sentence and the federal authorities who prosecuted the squad viewed him as its most culpable member. Wayne Jenkins a former Marine? Jenkins said hed tried to be nice, but now they were going to jail. BALTIMORE One of the main players in the Baltimore Police Department's Gun Trace Task Force corruption scandal is asking for compassionate release from prison. He reviewed hours of body camera footage from their arrests, watched tapes of their courtroom appearances, reviewed several thousand pages of documents, including internal police department files, and interviewed dozens of people including two of the convicted officers, some of the gun unit's victims, other current and former Baltimore police officers and commanders, defense attorneys and prosecutors. "It's still hard though, because I get a lot of pain in my mouth at night. Over his tenure, he was. This is his senior portrait from 1998. Jenkins, along with Detective Ben Frieman, had followed an African American man driving a nice car through Northeast Baltimore. But Internal Affairs was still working on the case that the States Attorneys Office had decided it could not pursue: the suspicion that Jenkins might have planted drugs in a car to justify an arrest. Having taken money before with previous squads, he expected the officers might skim some and submit the rest as cover. But when the officers exited the elevators on the building's second floor, they were met by an FBI SWAT team. Jenkins doled out $5,000 to each of the two officers and instructed them not to make any big purchases. He's due to be released in 2038. The bag contained masks and other gear he used while stealing drugs and cash from people he and his team targeted. They stole drugs and cash, sold seized narcotics and guns back on the street, planted evidence on people, even committed home invasions. In the gloom I see the number of the bureau of prisons light up my cell phone screen. In our conversation, Jenkins says that that's not true - members of the squad did steal money that day, but from somewhere else in the house. By the time his criminal streak was in full swing, it entailed high-stakes robberies and breaking and entering even as he was bringing in paychecks totaling over $170,000 in a year, in part because of overtime fraud. After three weeks of astonishing testimony, the jury found the two remaining officers guilty. Wayne Jenkins and his plainclothes colleagues operated in a world where success and misconduct were not mutually exclusive and sometimes seemed to go hand in hand. In the spring of 2015, the city of Baltimore was rocked by civil unrest after the in-custody death of 25-year-old Freddie Gray. I will continue to fight to prove my innocence.". De Sousa, who later served as commissioner and is currently serving time on federal tax charges, says he doesnt remember the case. In Baltimore, theyre often referred to as knockers, a reference to their historically aggressive tactics. "It's nothing I've ever imagined. During his time on the streets of Baltimore Jenkins was involved in several arrests that resulted in the injuries of the people he took into custody. He also names two former supervisors who he says he complained to about his former subordinate officers, Momodu Gondo and Jemell Rayam, saying they had bad reputations for stealing money. Judge Blake ultimately decided to sentence him to 25 years, saying she was taking into consideration the fact that he pleaded guilty and co-operated to some extent with the prosecutors. Detectives Maurice Ward, Evodio Hendrix, Momodu Gondo and Jemell Rayam all pleaded guilty. "I never took nothing from a looter, so help me god. Jenkins pleaded guilty in January and admitted taking part in at least 10 robberies of Baltimore citizens, planting drugs on innocent people and re-selling drugs he stole from suspects on an almost daily basis, including heroin, cocaine and prescription painkillers. They claimed they didnt see who did it. Jenkins explained that hed already tracked the man to Essex, so he thought they could stake out the home, go through the mans trash and find something to parlay into a search warrant. The topic: Can we get Wayne Jenkins? Then they could enter the house and take the money, only later calling county officers to say they were executing the warrant. And Jenkins, whod been identified as a rising talent early in his career, was celebrated among department brass and rank and file officers as a leader with an uncanny knack for delivering the goods. I never aimed nothing at him . "And I remember taking the $10,000.". The important difference, however, is that the drug dealers never swore an oath to serve and protect. Back then, Jenkins escaped scrutiny again. In a recent interview, Simon told The Sun, I never had no BB gun. But the scope and breadth of these allegations were staggering. If his arrest was stunning, the depiction of his civil rights violations, robberies and more wasnt news to everyone certainly not to people who had been in Jenkins sights, fairly or not, over the years.